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Bombs, Bread and Information War
The other bomb finally dropped, with U.S. and
British bomber and cruise missile attacks on Afghanistan on October 7th. There
aren't many targets, and it doesn't take many to hit anything that counts.
Communications, armor units, terrorist training camps and warplanes are about
all the Afghans have. The current attacks were said be primarily at the air
defense system (communications, radars ammunition dumps and the few dozen
aircraft the Taliban have) as well as 23 terrorist camps and at least one
Taliban combat unit. When president Bush announced the attacks he also mentioned
air drops of relief supplies, and the efforts to avoid hitting civilians with
any of the missiles. This reminds us that this war is about public opinion as
much as it is about destroying military targets. The war against
Afghanistan is largely a propaganda war. Or, as it is called today, "Information
War." This is a new kind of war, first discovered by the Pentagon in the 1980s
when the US military realized that mass media had reached the point where it was
a weapon of war. Previously, you demoralized the enemy population, making them
willing to surrender, by defeating their armed forces. But nuclear weapons have
made all out war rather more risky, and fighting to the finish on the
battlefield in some minor war got more Americans killed than the US public would
tolerate. Vietnam was an example of that, with the communists winning the media
war by dragging the war out until the American people got tired of it and
demanded withdrawal. That was the major lesson the American military got from
Vietnam, and the development of information war doctrine was a result.
Information war is keeping your eye on how your military actions play in the
media, and how the vast numbers of people that watch the media react. In
Afghanistan, the use of bombs, and especially bread, is the preferred tactic.
Bread (and other humanitarian aid) for the Afghan population can weaken support
for the Taliban, and resistance to the American search for bin Laden and his
fellow terrorists. While delivering some of this aid by parachute us very
expensive, it’s an effort much appreciated by Pakistan and Iran, where nearly
four million Afghan refugees already live in uneasy proximity with the locals.
This will be the first war where civil affairs troops (the folks that deal with
civilians in the combat zone) will sometimes go in first. While the Afghans have
traditionally shot at armed invaders, they are likely to be far more welcoming
towards soldiers bearing bread and medicine. This tactic is not without
risk. The Taliban still have supporters in Afghanistan, and these guys have guns
they are willing to use against any Americans, no matter how much bread they are
carrying. But images of American soldiers guarding food supplies from hostile
Taliban troops would be an information war plus. The sight of American
transports parachuting food to isolated Afghans is a dramatic image that
counteracts the sight of exploding buildings. The radicals in Islamic
nations are a minority, but a dedicated minority determined to stop the future.
The Taliban banned television and movies because it showed images of the modern
world we take for granted. There is a religious war underway in Islamic nations,
with the majority eager to embrace education, technology and mass media. While
the radicals are not opposed to useful technology, they oppose any education
that will have an impact on religious beliefs. But it is not just religious
beliefs, but traditional customs as well. The restrictive treatment of women in
Islamic nations is more a matter of custom than religion. But the defense of
these customs has been merged with the defense of Islam. It’s a losing battle,
the Islamic fundamentalists know it, and they have been escalating their
violence as their ultimate defeat becomes more obvious. One bit of
technology Islamic fundamentalists have embraced is mass media. Even though they
condemn it, they use it. The fundamentalists know that the right images and
slogans can enrage fellow Moslems who may not agree with the entire
fundamentalist program. While Bin Laden condemns television, he uses video
cassettes for training and propaganda. The majority of Moslems are quite happy
to make use of the entertainment and news mass media provide and note the
inconsistent treatment of media by the radicals, Moreover, Moslem men do
feel very threatened by the freedoms Western women have. But this isn’t about
religion. Japanese men were resentful after World War II when Japanese women
began to adopt American concepts of what a woman could do and be. The same drama
is still played out in America as immigrants from nations with different
cultures find that their children, especially their daughters (and sometimes
their wives) demand new freedoms that are considered normal in the United
States. As a result, Moslem men are particularly eager to hit the streets and
protest these new Western ideas. The Moslem radicals are preying on fear of
change as well as an unfounded defense of religious beliefs. The current
information war aims to remove fear of Americans in Afghanistan, not fear of
change in the Islamic world. Keeping score in this kind of war requires looking
at the degree of civil unrest in Moslem nations, especially Pakistan. If the
radicals have no media images to inflame public anger, the crowds will not come
and violently protest. If that happens, America is winning the information war.
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